Berney L. Stauss

Phone: 504.523.0033
Fax: 504.523.0109
Email: berneystrauss@straussandking.com

Berney grew up in Alabama and was elected president of the student council in high school. He was also awarded the Sewanee University award for Best All Around Junior. He attended Dartmouth College in the Ivy League where he graduated at the top of his class and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He graduated summa cum laude in 1973. In 1975, he received a Masters degree from Yale University. He earned his law degree from Tulane in 1978 where he was selected a finalist in the Tulane Moot Court, a two-year trial tournament. At Tulane Law School, Berney was chosen as one of four finalists in a two-year tournament to determine the best trial lawyers in his class at Tulane Law School.

After Tulane, he worked for five years at Phelps, Dunbar, the largest maritime offshore defense firm in the country. He then became a Partner in charge of handling maritime personal injury cases at Barham and Churchill. In 1986, he started his own law practice devoted to representing victims of serious personal injury cases specializing in maritime offshore cases.

Berney is one of a handful of attorneys who is admitted to practice throughout the Gulf Coast (Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida) and New York. Because he is licensed in many states, he can represent you if you are from one state (for example, Mississippi or Louisiana) and you are injured or your company is headquartered in another state (for example, if you are injured in Louisiana and your company is headquartered in Texas), Strauss & King can file your suit in any of those states without having to refer the case to another firm, for example, a law firm in Texas, where you may not receive as much personal attention as you would if the case were being handled by the firm you hired. Berney has tried cases throughout the Gulf Coast. Early in Berney's career, he was credited with obtaining some of the largest settlements in Louisiana and some of the largest jury verdicts. Berney has won many million dollar verdicts, including representing five victims of the Rowan Odessa explosion and two victims of the Romere Pass pipeline explosion.

Berney has served as an adjunct professor of law at Tulane University for five years, teaching trial advocacy to students there.